The Impact of Thoughts on Health

“The mind and body are like parallel universes. Anything that happens in the mental universe must leave tracks in the physical one.” Deepak Chopra

Most have heard the adage: “As goes the mind so goes the body”, but I am not so sure that many of us fully understand just how true that saying is. The concept of a healthy mind equaling a healthy body is not new. In fact, it has been the core focus of philosophies associated with soundness since the beginning of recorded testaments on health and longevity. The idea appears to have originated from the ancient Roman poet Juvenal, who coined the Latin phrase “mens sana in corpore sano” ("a healthy mind in a healthy body") around the first century AD, but the full impact of the mind influence on the health has only emerged as valid science over the past 50 or so years.  

During my 47 plus years as a health care practitioner interacting with thousands of patients, I can share with certainty that the state of your physical health directly impacts mental wellbeing. But, when you turn it around and examine the equation through the lens of the mind’s impact of the health of the body, it serves up a lot grayer haze than it does clarity.  The statements: “You are what you think, or you become what you think about most”, makes little sense to many. I mean how could it? The body is this tangible physical thing while your thoughts are just those often-random musings going round in your head. In fact, it has been my experience that the average person rarely if ever, appreciates the real influence that their thoughts and subsequently the attitudes those thoughts create have upon their health and longevity. My grandmother used to say that “stinkin thinkin will kill ya”, and it took a lot of years for me to appreciate just how true that statement was. In the brain, there is a relatively small but critical component called the hippocampus. The hippocampus plays important roles in the consolidation of information from short-term memory to long-term memory, and in spatial memory that enables navigation. In Alzheimer's disease (and other forms of dementia), the hippocampus is one of the first regions of the brain to be damaged; short-term memory loss and disorientation are included among the early symptoms. Negative thoughts have been shown to command profound influence upon the hippocampus, leading to structural and functional changes. Chronic stress and negative thinking patterns can shrink the hippocampus, impairing its ability to form positive memories or recall positive experiences. This can result in forgetfulness, difficulty acquiring new skills, and challenges adapting to new situations. The hippocampus, crucial for memory formation and emotional regulation, is particularly affected by  negative thought patterns. 

Thoughts and the mindsets they create are the supreme architect of the reality you either enjoy or despise, and at the same time the only gateway to effectively improving one’s lot in life. The concept of your mind influencing your physical health has most recently been referred to as the “mind-body connection”. In a 2024 article entitled: “The Mind-Body Connection: How Thoughts Can Impact Heath and Wellbeing” by Maitree Batel, the author states: “The mind-body connection refers to the bidirectional relation between mental and physical health, where psychological stress influences physiological functioning and visa-versa. Our thoughts, emotions and beliefs can trigger neurochemical and hormonal responses in the body affecting immune function, inflammation, hormone levels, blood pressure and other physiological processes.” If this sounds like you can talk yourself sick or healthy…you really can! Let me attempt to unpack this a little for you.

We all know that the mind is essentially divided into two distinct but related components, the conscious which is essentially the intellectual demonstration of awareness, and the unconscious which is the real workhorse and is the part that keeps all the functional parts of being alive in sound working order. It is this segment that keeps you breathing, your heart beating as well as the monitoring and the implementation of every other vital function associated with life. Although it works independent of the conscious mind, it very much takes direction from it, and with that, allows the conscious or volitional mind access to the magnificently complex and orderly integrity of intelligence directing this machine we call the human body. When a challenging or stressful situation arises and the conscious mind lacks discipline or fails to appreciate the power it wields, it is not unlike giving the keys for a Ferrari to a three-year-old and expecting them to win the Le Mans. In short, anything can happen, and you can pretty much be assured that the endgame is not going to be good. Let me illustrate this for you. When you allow your musings and attitudes to constantly revolve around fear, anger, disappointment, jealousy, or other negative thoughts, circumstances and anticipations, the resultant stress and discomfort create a cascade of physiological processes proven to negatively impact core functional process such as digestion, immune function, blood pressure and cardiac integrity. Add to that the increased vulnerability to degenerative ailments such as arthritis, headaches, muscular aches, pains and stiffness, various breathing disorders, skin conditions, dementia, diabetes, and elevated inflammatory responses, and of course the “big C” cancer. Now, am I saying that your thoughts alone cause disease and disability? No, but the stress reactions that they create in the body most certainly do.

In today’s world, it is not difficult to find things to get stressed out about. There is an overabundance of negativity out there and with the communications bombardment and overload contained within that two-inch by six-inch weapon we all carry with us called a phone, there is no escaping the horrors of the world around us. I don’t believe that the human brain was designed to absorb or manage the levels of negativity that one can access in a matter or seconds by just the simple engaging in the process of scrolling the available news feeds that instantly tell us of every war, disaster, or crime occurring from Hobart to Reykjavik. We suffer “news pollution” and it is impacting the way we think, our attitudes to the world around us and through that our health. The most heinous part of this is that it is virtually impossible to escape, independent of going off the grid in the Yukon, which for most of us would just mean a more immediate death as few have the where-with-all to exist independently. 

We are now living in a world where to survive with intellectual integrity, we will need to re-wire our brains to deflect negative stimuli and flush out the garbage already consciously and unconsciously imbedded in our minds. Never in the history of the world has there been more of a need for disciplined conscious thought. We live in Dante’s inferno with little in the form of hope or effective tools to fashion an escape and it has all happened surreptitiously without warning. It started with the advent of the computer and then the internet, and will, if early indicators come to pass, only worsen as AI continues to blossom. Deming’s quote "You do not have to adapt to change, survival is not mandatory" has never been more poignant. The explosion in mental illness is a plague of far worse proportions and catastrophic impact than COVID or any mass affliction preceding it. It is creating a heinous and insidious culling of the herd that does not immediately kill its victims, but far worse, isolates and paralyzes them, infecting their minds before consuming their bodies and there is absolutely no evidence of anything on the horizon resembling a resolve. Examples embedded in the cascading societal breakdown are all around us with traditional approaches to treatment failing miserably to stem an ever-rising tide of illness and despair.

It is impossible to turn back the clock on this one, so the only way forward is to fashion new weapons to slay the hydra. Ones that build upon our innate intellectual equity which has allowed us to evolve and survive over thousands of generations and which up to the last 50 or so years served us with relative effectiveness. So, where do we find this magic potion? At least in part it is found in the person sitting next to you. It is where it always was, embedded in the “clan”. We must understand that no one can survive as an island, and that our only gateway out of this mess is through re-establishing true senses of community with the word communication being the key component of community. An environment, within which, dialogue is open and safe, where burdens can be shared without judgement, resentment or abandonment. A protective sanctuary contained within a bulwark of non-negotiable rules, accountabilities and consequences which protect the integrity of the collective and by doing so allow for reasoned rights and privileges. The past few years have demonstrated conclusively that mankind is incapable of surviving in isolation. When the social fabric is torn, the strength of the clan is compromised making the weak among us easy prey for the opportunists, sociopaths, and political necromancers.  We see them all around us in the failing accountability of our defining institutions such as government, banking, insurance, commerce and sadly healthcare. Conscience has been usurped by profit and control…without regard for any negative impact that may be leveled upon the society that birthed these institutions. A new stable community must be forged that is grounded in logic and principles of fairness, that truly reflects the essence of the democratic principle. The gist of which revolves around one over-arching principle…  “For the good of the majority.” In the western world there really are no minorities anymore, just special interest groups. We are all human beings. We are born and then we die, and in between we all breath the same air.

This means that we must again learn to trust. Even if only in one other person as a start. Stress and emotional volatility have always been, and will inevitably continue to be, part of the human experience. In my 47 plus years of practice, I can say with certainty, that I have never encountered a human being who, at one point or another, has not suffered some form of mental illness in their lives. Nobody deals with all of life stressors without one or more serving, to at least temporarily, overwhelm their ability to cope with effectiveness. The difference between those who surmount their difficulties and those who fail, I believe is a measure of the strength of the personal community surrounding those individuals, and their level of reasoned emotional resilience. This circles us back to the critical importance of self-talk.

My understanding of the importance of thoughts and their subsequent impact upon attitudes to health, started off as a series of observations accumulated during more than four decades in practice as I witnessed what made people sick and, more importantly, what appeared to get them better and keep them well.  As patients shared some of the miraculous improvements that occurred in their health (often because they made seemingly simple alterations in how they processed life and the world they live in), it dawned on me that the pursuit of wellness was essentially an inside job. By far, most of us at birth were provided a complete set of the required tools to maintain a state of health, repair/rebuild, and live long and satisfying lives. I started to look at health not as a separate entity that is gained or lost, but rather as the intended expression of life itself. Most of us think that we live in the outside world, but the reality of it is, life happens between the ears.

As mentioned, previous, what goes on inside your head can be either poison or elixir and only you can decide which Cool Aide you are going to drink. I know that many readers are thinking, “this is impossible.” Please, don’t insult your intelligence by thinking for a second that you have no control over your thoughts, because if not, then my question back to you would be, who does? Think about this for just a second. To blame anyone, much less any circumstance or situation for how you think or the attitudes you harbour is absurd. Every event, calamity and circumstance is neutral until you tie meaning to it. This is not to say that terrible things do not happen, of course they do, but your reaction to these things and the emotion you attach to them is what gives them life, even in the case of your wellbeing. If you are wrestling with a health issue, acknowledging that what goes on inside your head might, at least in part, have contributed to the development of the condition might in the long run save your life. Perhaps even more importantly, the thoughts you live with, will with certainty, impact how well you handle your issue and the likelihood of successfully getting through it. This is not conjecture, this is absolute fact. Your body is a direct reflection of the thoughts and subsequent decisions that you have made during your life, full stop! At first blush this might be tough to wrap your head around, but like it or not, it’s the truth. Now let’s push to the bedrock of both wellness and longevity. 

You can shelve diet and exercise as the wellspring of health and a long life if you don’t have your headspace in order. I know of only one avenue to positively impact health with any certainty. It happens by reframing our core beliefs and attitudes about the process itself, by seeing health, not disease, as the natural intent of the life process. This idea is a real stretch for some of us. We are being conditioned to believe that we have no dominion over our health and certainly little influence over how long we may live. I assure you with certainty that if you buy into this notion, your life will be short and one of miserable dependence. I am sure that some of you are asking: “What’s the need for all this changing my head space stuff?” Well, fact is, with many people suffering chronic health or weight management issues, there are ingrained patterns of behaviour that have failed them in the past. Most have failed to successfully change their health even though they believe that they have tried everything. The truth is, if we cannot identify weakening beliefs or habits and then implement an efficient strategy to overcome them, we inevitably revert to old, established patterns of destructive behaviour. No matter how good the program might be, it will be a temporary fix at best. Norman Vincent Peale said,

“If you change your thoughts, you change your world."

In his book Quantum Healing 1, the renowned neurologist Deepak Chopra estimated that the average human has about sixty thousand thoughts a day and about 90 percent are the same thoughts we had yesterday. Other research may pose different numbers, but the point is that most of us continue to rewind the same tape and play it again every day. This alone is the major reason why it is so difficult for people to change. How can we expect to change who we are when we are constantly thinking about the same things and generating the same feelings? If our thoughts don’t change, our actions and outcomes will essentially remain the same as well. It is a classic case of continuing to do the same thing but expecting a different outcome. How often have you heard someone complain that no matter what they try they just can’t lose weight/attract an ideal partner/get a good job/whatever? If our lives reflect our most dominant thoughts, and most of today’s thoughts are the same ones as yesterday, how can things change? You are pretty much doomed to have the same partner, a bad job and remain heavy forever. Even worse, if most of those thoughts are negative, which is often the case, especially for people in crisis, how can we expect to change our state without altering what is going on inside our head? If we spend the day telling ourselves that we are too old, too tired or that we have no energy, what type of life are we going to have? It will probably be one that is too old, too tired and without much energy. It just makes sense! Watch what you are saying to yourself because there is someone inside who is listening—the real workhorse in life, your subconscious mind. This version of you doesn’t care what you think, their job is to execute. If you are constantly telling him/her that you have a horrible life, they are going to look for ways to verify those thoughts.

We need to change how we think, I order to create a lasting change in how we live. We all believe that we know what we need to do to make our lives better, but what most of us are not aware of is the unconscious negative chatter that is constantly going on inside your head that may be undermining your attempts to make your life better. In closing, I want to share with you one of my most valuable life experiences. It happened when I met Bob.

A number of years ago, a wonderful gentleman named Bob entered my life. At that time, he was in his mid-eighties, and I had the pleasure of working with him periodically, up to his death near ninety. Upon reviewing his intake forms on our first visit, I noticed that Bob had experienced pretty much every disease known to man. He was on a list of medications as long as his arm and experienced great physical difficulty moving even for short distances. 

I remarked about his litany of illnesses, and his response has stayed with me to this day. With a grin that radiated life, he turned to me and said, “You know, Doug, if you live long enough, you are just about sure to get everything.” We both laughed, and an instant bond of friendship was born. During my few short years with Bob, he said many things that made me laugh and some that made me cry. I grew to love and admire the spiritual giant inside this weathered and frail little man. 

Perhaps his most important gift came the same day he told me he was diagnosed with terminal cancer. He joked as usual attempting to diffuse my obvious discomfort. 

I asked him. “With everything you’ve been through, how do you remain so upbeat and happy?”

He flashed a spectacular smile and said, “I get up every morning and have two choices: to be happy or sad. I simply make the logical one.”

This changed how I viewed life and the world around me from that point on, and I want to share that truth with you. Fact is, the reality that you enjoy or abhor, belongs to you, and only you can control it. According to Trevor Moawad, “Mindset Expert, it is believed that every negative thought as seven to ten times the impact of a positive one. Every day, we have a choice about how we are going to process the world around us. I am not saying we should pretend that a shitty situation is good, but I cannot get over the number of people, especially those over the age of 55 who go out of their way to see the negative in everything. This alone serves to make people sick and shortens their lives.

Although he lived a life marked by suffering and illness, Bob never got old. His attitude always reflected hope, compassion, and a selfless spirit of giving. He taught me the following priceless life lessons worth sharing:

1. It is how we choose to think that defines us as young or old, not the years. 

2. It is in how we process the world around us and what we qualify as important in our lives that creates our age-specific reality. 

3. It is not the disappointments, sickness, and disability inherent in the ageing process, but rather our reactions to these things that sets the direction for life’s wheel and how far it will roll.

4.  Perhaps most importantly, Bob shared divine wisdom when he said, “In your day-to-day thoughts, never, ever revisit the pain of past mistakes. Instead, always seek out and appreciate the magnificent and unique potential contained inside each moment.”

The greatest tragedy in death is not the dying. It is the realization that there will be no more tomorrows to craft your happiness from, and that the only thing freely given to us at birth to mould and sculpt—a life—is finished. The words “I wish I had…” are all too often followed by a last breath. 

It is our inspired intelligence that ties us to the creator. When we dare to dream at any age, we not only plant the seeds for our future growth, but we become a mini creator by constructing something (an idea) out of nothing. For so many of us, the aging process and with that the failure of our health, begins the day we trade our dreams for rules and orphan our innocence. 

No one plans to die sad or unfulfilled. Not one among us ever anticipated disease, impairment, or disability when we were young, and yet almost inevitably it happens. Bob taught me that if I can think, I can still fashion an inspired life. This requires a second paradigm shift: the necessity of kicking our past to the curb. 

We are where we are, because of the sum of previous thoughts, decisions, and actions. The past is a mishmash of feelings and experiences that have no life on their own other than what we choose to give them through our memory and will. Many people view their existence through the lens of only negative experience, which often crowds out potential for growth and improvement. This is like the movie Groundhog Day where a cynical TV weatherman named Phil (Bill Murray) gets trapped in a time warp and is forced to relive the same day, every day. We can only change direction by consciously deciding to leave life’s accumulated garbage where it belongs: at the curb. 

The first step is to establish accountability. What I mean by this is that we must acknowledge and accept the consequences of our previous choices, without judgment. Forgiving ourselves for the folly of being human is the most liberating gift you can give yourself. This get out of jail free card offers a fresh start to life. If you are serious about changing your life, it is time to carve out a new and empowering attitude of possibility. This is especially valid when it comes to those with emotional burdens associated with health concerns.

Have you ever noticed how hard it is to give up your “bad stuff”? Some people spend their whole lives accumulating frustrations and disappointments. Then they fashion them into a colourless patchwork cape of fear or scepticism to be worn as a barrier against any potential for positive change. In doing so, they not only fail to protect against the darkness of apprehension, but they block out the light of future possibility and growth. If this rings a bell, take heed. This emotional cancer is as deadly as its physical brother—perhaps worse—because it leaves your body alive but kills your soul.

Most of us who are mobile, coherent, nourished, and clothed, still have capacity to influence how we experience health, replenish vitality and, best of all, age. By transforming your attitude, you will have taken the most important step towards changing your life, and tangible results will appear sooner than you think.

While a positive future direction is still very much in control for most of us, this is not the case for everyone. For those who have crossed too many health loss thresholds, there may be few or no remaining options. Decide now that this just cannot happen to you. It is still your life, and the freedom to fashion a change remains within your grasp and it all happens first with your thoughts.

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1. Chopra, Deepak. “Quantum Healing,” First published in 1989. Revised by Penguin/Random House 2012.

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About the Author: Dr. POOLEY has been in practice for over 46 years, is a former champion bodybuilder and author of the book the Un-Diet Diet.